The Cantaloupe Thief

by Deb Richardson-Moore

  Tabitha chuckled behind him. “She can’t hear you, Mr Ramsey. You wan’ me to tell her?”

  “No, you go up and down those stairs enough. If she’s late to her doctor’s appointment, she’s just late, I guess.”

  At that moment, he heard his mother’s bedroom door open. “Ramsey, I am ready to go,” she said. “Did I not say we would leave at 10:45?”

  He sighed. “Yes, Mother.”

  In the driveway, he held open the passenger door to his BMW. Even at eighty, his mother seated herself sideways, then primly swung both legs into the car’s interior. He mentally rolled his eyes, remembering poor Amanda undergoing etiquette lessons: How a Young Lady Properly Enters an Automobile. There were worse things than being Alberta Resnick’s son. Namely, being her daughter.

  He slammed the door shut, then hopped into the driver’s seat. “Dr Arnott’s, I presume?”

  His mother nodded.

  “So what were you and Amanda talking about?” he asked as he backed out of the driveway.

  “Just a little legal matter.” His mother sighed, as if exhausted. “I would prefer not to go into it.”

  “Your call.” He said it lightly, but inwardly he seethed. Why does she do this? Play one child against the other? “Do you want to tell me what the doctor is seeing you for?”

  “He has not been able to control my blood pressure to his satisfaction. He seems to think I’m at risk for a stroke.”

  “Then he’s right, Mother. Blood pressure is nothing to play around with.”

  The drive to Dr Baxter Arnott’s office in a converted house near St Joseph Medical Center took only a few minutes. If his mother had been able to find a doctor still practicing in his eighties, she would have done so. As it was, Dr Arnott, who had to be past seventy, was the closest she could find. He’d been her physician for twenty years.

  Ramsey settled himself in the waiting room with a Field & Stream. When a nurse called his mother, she surprised him by beckoning him to accompany her. Bewildered, he joined her in one of the doctor’s homey examination rooms, where she took a seat, wordlessly, in a wing chair. A nurse took her blood pressure, and moments later Dr Arnott entered.

  “Your blood pressure is still higher than I’d like, Alberta,” he said. “I recommend that we try another medication.”

  “Very well,” she said. “I’ll do whatever you think best. But the reason I brought Ramsey is there’s something I want both of you to hear. As you know, Ramsey holds my health care power of attorney. For years, it has contained a Do Not Resuscitate order. I would like to revoke that.”

  Ramsey looked up in confusion. If Dr Arnott was surprised, he didn’t show it.

  “But Mother, you’ve always talked about not wanting to be hooked up to breathing machines or feeding tubes or anything like that.”

  She shrugged her pink-clad shoulders.

  “As you get older, Ramsey, you begin to think a little differently. Should anything happen to me, I want you, and only you, to make the decision about withdrawing life support. I want you to satisfy yourself that I have no chance of coming back to my senses. Then it will be fine to end things. But perhaps that DNR order was a little hasty.”

  “Fine, Mother. We will certainly do whatever you wish.”

  That’s what Ramsey was saying aloud at least. Inwardly, he wondered what had changed his mother’s mind. And did it have anything to do with the legal matter Amanda was handling?

  On the drive home, Ramsey attempted to learn more about his mother’s abrupt change of mind, but he got nowhere. She did, however, seem more relaxed than he’d seen her since before yesterday’s party.

  “Ramsey, you needn’t come in,” she said, as his car glided to the back door. “Thank you for driving me.” She opened her door, swung her legs in tandem to the driveway. “And Ramsey,” she added, giving him a rare and hesitant smile, “I hope you know that I trust you. And love you.”

  Ramsey nodded, dumbstruck. He hadn’t heard those words from his mother in three decades.

  Alberta Resnick opened her back door and stepped into her kitchen. Amanda was always on at her to update it, but the faded wallpaper and clunky appliances were fine with her. What the younger generation didn’t appreciate, she found, was the comfort of familiar things. That’s why she lived the way she did — in this much-too-large house, with a maid of forty years and a twenty-five-year-old Thunderbird. If she had her way, those decades-old shrubs out back would stay the same too. But she’d gotten tired of her sons’ muttering about snakes and rodents. Didn’t snakes keep the rodents out anyway? She supposed she’d allow them to be pruned come fall.

  Her chihuahua Dollie came trotting out of the den, eyes blinking.

  “You were on my couch, weren’t you?” Alberta greeted her. She checked the dog’s water and food bowls, and saw that Tabitha had fed her before leaving.

  She opened the pantry, took out peanut butter and white bread. She searched in the refrigerator for a banana, and prepared her guilty-pleasure lunch: a peanut butter and banana sandwich, a triple helping of potato chips, and a glass of Tabitha’s sweet tea over ice. She carried the meal into her den, a comfortably shabby room off the kitchen and out of sight of the formal parlor and dining room. She kicked off her pumps with a sigh, and settled on one end of the sofa to watch her soap opera.

  She pinched off a piece of bread crust and gave it to Dollie. She took a bite out of the sandwich, the crunchy peanut butter, ripe banana and fresh bread making a tasty combination. And then in the midst of this simple enjoyment, an annoyance: a knock on her kitchen door.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  PRESENT DAY

  “I’m a little surprised you can take off in the middle of the day,” Branigan said to Liam as they climbed back into the Jericho Road van outside Marshall’s.

  “My boss seldom messes with my schedule,” he said. “Unless you count funerals and hospital visitation, in which case He messes quite a bit.”

  “Well, I’m glad you can help me find Rita. I’m sure you’ll have better luck than I would.”

  Their first stop was the main branch of the library, located at the corner of Oakley and Anders streets — the intersection where Vesuvius Hightower and his mangled bike were found. The library was a sleek building of glass and brick, with none of the homey warmth of the library on South Main that Branigan remembered from her youth. Inside, everything was hard surfaces, leather and vinyl and wood seating, gun-metal gray tile and carpeting. She wondered for the first time if the décor had been chosen with the homeless in mind. Liam once told her he’d had to remove fabric chairs and sofas from all the public areas of Jericho Road; they’d been soaked in grime, sweat, urine — and worse.

  Several years earlier, she’d written a story on the removal of a public phone from the library’s front desk. The director had explained that homeless people stood in a never-ending line to use it. Conversations grew heated. Fights broke out. The Rambler didn’t usually cover the library’s sleepy board meetings, but for awhile, taxpaying citizens were roaring for a fix and homeless rights advocates were pushing back.

  Now the homeless were welcome in this public place, but there was no phone for them to use. From the entrance, Liam and Branigan recognized many of his churchgoers, some at the computers, others at desks along the room’s perimeter, still others — did they have money? — at the smattering of round lunch tables in the Book It Café.

  Liam began walking the perimeter. At every table, Branigan saw people greeting him with a smile, a word, a hug. He bent to talk to each one, presumably asking for Rita’s whereabouts, because she saw a lot of shaking heads.

  He next made his way to the audio-visual wing, where two lines of computer stations, ten per line, allowed free internet access. Even on a Monday afternoon, the room was nearly full, with only three stations not in use. It was impossible to tell with certainty who was homeless and who wasn’t, but Liam knew many by sight. He moved easily among five people engrossed in their screens, then retu
rned to where Branigan stood.

  “No one saw Rita under the bridge this morning or at St James for breakfast,” he reported. “Or they don’t remember seeing her. Most of them said she could have been there. They just weren’t looking.”

  “Let’s drive around town a little, then head to the bridge,” Branigan suggested. “I guess she could still be asleep.”

  They circled to the far north end of Main Street, beyond the courthouse, then cruised down the center of town. “Just like high school, baby,” said Liam, “except for the whole driving in a church van thing.”

  “It’s as good as that old Beetle you drove.”

  “Hey, don’t mock. I’m restoring that for Chan.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No, Charlie won’t touch it, but Chan thinks it’s cool. Or reverse cool. Or so uncool it’s cool. Or something like that.”

  “Drive slower,” she commanded.

  “More slowly, newspaper lady.”

  Branigan scoured both sides of the street for Rita. At this time of day, not a whole lot of people were out, so she was confident she hadn’t missed her.

  After they passed The Rambler, they drove another eight blocks south, past a used car lot, seedy bars and light industrial sites. Branigan doubted that Rita would be out this far.

  “Let’s try the bridge,” Liam said, turning west.

  Trash had increased along the path to the bridge. Mildewed clothes and discarded beer bottles made up the bulk of it, but there were also watermelon rinds rotting in the sun, covered with black flies.

  “Whoever brought that watermelon is probably not too popular about now,” Liam said.

  They walked hurriedly along the hard-baked path and into the welcome shade of the river birch. There wasn’t a breath of breeze beneath the bridge, and no one was visible — just empty tents, fire pits and the pit bull she’d learned was named Bruno.

  “That’s her place,” Branigan said, pointing to the outermost plywood structure forty-five feet up the concrete incline.

  “Rita!” Liam called. Then again, “Rita!”

  He looked at Branigan’s shoes. “Guess we’re going to hike,” he said.

  She shed her open-toed sandals and purse, and started barefoot up the steep incline. Liam, in rubber-soled work boots, followed.

  “After all this time, I’ve never been up here,” he said, crisscrossing his feet the way Malachi had. “I always wondered how hard it was.”

  Branigan didn’t speak, concentrating on placing one foot across the other so she didn’t tip over and roll down the incline.

  Liam matched his pace to hers, holding his arms out occasionally when he feared she was about to slip. They made it to the rudimentary door of the plywood shack, and knocked. Liam called Rita’s name again. No answer.

  He reached past Branigan to push open the door. They could see immediately there was no one inside. But Liam was fascinated.

  “Wow! This is some set-up.” Slender bunk beds, held together by two-by-fours, anchored the inside wall. Studs on the outer wall were used as simple shelves, which were lined with cans of food. A row of bottled waters filled the bottom rung. “Here’s our stuff,” he said, picking up a bottle with his church’s blue and white label: “God loves you. And so does Jericho Road.” The entire structure was seven feet long and four feet deep. “I wouldn’t want our middle-schoolers to see this. They’d think it was a great way to camp. I wonder who built this.”

  Branigan wasn’t nearly as interested in the engineering as she was in Rita’s absence.

  “I guess I’ll head back to the office, then try the Methodist church at 5 o’clock,” she said. “I don’t know what else to do.”

  Branigan arrived at Covenant Methodist at 4:45 p.m., and found a crowd milling in the parking lot. She roamed around, looking for Rita, but didn’t see her. Promptly at 5 p.m., church volunteers opened the doors, calling out for people to please line up single file.

  Branigan didn’t get in line, but instead chose a seat near the door so she could see everyone who entered. A woman serving tea brought her a large cup.

  At 5:15, the tables were full and she still hadn’t seen Rita. Where in the world was she? Branigan’s cell phone rang, and she stepped outside to take the call.

  “Branigan!” Liam fairly shouted. “I’ve found Rita!”

  “Where?”

  “St Joe’s ER. Meet me there.” He hung up.

  She stood for a moment, confused. Why was Rita at the hospital?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  JULY 5, TEN YEARS AGO

  It was not quite noon when Rita Mae came down from her high. That was the good thing about crack, she thought. It didn’t take much of your day.

  Now, to get her favorite shoes back. She remembered the discomfort of walking through Alberta Resnick’s back yard, so she must have left them in the pool house. She didn’t want to face the old lady — didn’t want to tell her she’d been in the pool house with her grandson who was a decade younger. She’d just slip in and out. It was so overgrown back there no one in the main house would see her.

  Rita Mae’s parents had moved to the suburbs of Atlanta to help Rita Mae’s sister care for her children. Rita Mae now lived on Grambling’s Eastside, in an apartment complex with fourteen identical buildings and decently cared for grounds and pool. She put on dark-colored long pants and long sleeves, for protection against shrubbery, then socks and tennis shoes to cushion her sore feet. She found her faded Chevy Tahoe parked in its normal spot, and with a sigh of relief set out to retrace her route of the previous evening.

  She parked the Tahoe in the parking lot of the Methodist church on North Main Street. There were enough cars there so it wouldn’t draw attention. She set out for Mrs Resnick’s house two blocks away.

  The day was sticky with humidity, and when she turned onto Conestee Avenue, no one was stirring in the mid-day heat. Rita Mae walked unnoticed along the buckled sidewalks that occasionally reared up four inches or more from the persistent push of oak roots. She circled the block, not wanting to approach the Resnick property from the front. Fortunately, it looked as if the neighbors to the rear were gone for the holiday weekend.

  Rita Mae walked up their empty driveway, then through the jumble of woods that separated their back yard from Mrs Resnick’s. The underbrush snagged and yanked at her pants, and she was glad she hadn’t worn shorts. She emerged on the far side of Mrs Resnick’s pool, directly across from the pool house. She walked around the pool, thinking to try the front door before resorting to the bathroom window. She was in luck again. Ben hadn’t bolted the door; the knob turned at her touch.

  She tiptoed through the recreation room and into the bedroom where they’d been the night before. She didn’t see her shoes at first, and wondered if she’d lost them later. But then she saw the slight bump of the chenille spread and flipped it back to reveal her colorfully striped sandals.

  Grabbing them, she quickly exited the pool house without a sound. She was almost to the place where she intended to enter the woods when she heard voices and a dog barking; the sounds came from the main house.

  She wavered for a moment. Nobody had seen her, and if she cut straight through the neighbor’s yard, in all probability no one would.

  Mrs Resnick’s voice rang out, commanding as always, but with an unaccustomed shrillness. Rita Mae was surprised at how well she could hear, but then she realized the house’s back door was only thirty feet from where she stood. The density of the shrubbery and trees made it seem further.

  She heard another voice, but it was pitched lower. She couldn’t make out the words, partly because the dog’s yapping was growing increasingly frenzied.

  Mrs Resnick’s voice came again, shriller still. Something wasn’t right. Rita Mae’s curiosity overrode her caution. She crept behind the tree line, and inched toward the main house. She hid behind a massive magnolia, confident that no one could see her. The tree’s heavy leaves obscured the detached garage, and much of the pa
rking area. But she could see Mrs Resnick standing in her kitchen doorway in a pink dress, one hand on her hip, giving somebody what-for. An obnoxious chihuahua danced at her feet, yipping in a continuous blast.

  The other person’s back was to Rita Mae, so she couldn’t hear any words. But apparently Mrs Resnick could, and didn’t like what she heard. She abruptly slammed her kitchen door with such force its window panes rattled.

  Who is that? Rita Mae stared intently at the person’s back, unable to tell by the jeans and T-shirt if it was a man or woman. A family member?

  Then again, she had heard the stories, whispered at last night’s party, about a man living in Mrs Resnick’s pool house this spring. Was that him? From Mrs Resnick’s anger, it seemed likely. If so, she was probably calling the police right now. Rita Mae had best get going.

  Before she could creep from beneath the magnolia’s embrace, however, the person leaned over into the flower bed that flanked the parking area, chose a river rock the size of a softball, reared back and hurled it through the window pane.

  Rita Mae stifled a cry, too shocked to run. She heard Mrs Resnick’s scream of rage from inside, heard the dog’s bark rising in hysteria. Before thrusting a hand inside the broken pane, knocking shards both inside and out, the rock-thrower whipped around to look at the nearest neighbor’s house, then at the deep foliage where Rita Mae hid.

  In that moment, Rita Mae recognized the face.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  PRESENT DAY

  It took Branigan nearly ten minutes to drive through 5 o’clock traffic to St Joseph Medical Center, a mile and a half from downtown. She turned off the radio so she could think, and her mind ran perversely to Detroit. What if I were facing real 5 o’clock traffic? she thought crazily.

  She parked in a lot beside the emergency room, then ran as fast as her heels would allow up its circular drive. A metal detector took another two minutes. “If you want to keep your cell,” said the security guard, “you need to turn it off.” She tapped it off without looking.